Mechanical shuttle drive for circular looms



JWM- 2 W40. o. scHwlcHTENBERG 2,185,446

MECHANICAL SHUTTLE DRIVE FOR CIRCULAR LOOMS n Filed Aug. 29, 1959 2 sheets-sheet 1 l l w LJ f d@ hre/Mor:

2 Sheets-Sheet 2 N) E LH By W7 mmm n L C. SCHWICHTENBERG MECHANICAL SHUTTLE DRIVE FOR CIRCULAR LOOMS .Filed Aug. 29, 1939 Patented .-lan. 2, 1940 PATENT OFFICE MECHANICAL SHUTTLE DRIVE Foa cmcULAa LooMs.

Otto Schwichtenberg, Berlin, Germany, assigner to Internationaler Moratti Maschinenverkau! A. G., Berlin, Germany Application August 29, 1939, Serial No. 252,471 In Germany July 28, 1938 6 Claims.

This invention relates to circular looms with mechanical shuttle drive.

VBoth mechanical and electrical shuttle drives have been proposed but haveheretofore been attended by disadvantages preventing their general adoption inV looms of this kind. The electrical drives had rotary magnet systems or moving fields which were unreliable, cumbersome and expensive and they required synchronizing devices which rendered a simple construction impossible. The electrical parts alone constituted a considerable equipment making the loom expensive and bulky.

Mechanical drives have heretofore employed pressure rolls or the like acting .directly on the shuttle, or they operated on the inertia principle using tumbler discs or rotary cams acting on radially arranged lever groups.

Other mechanical circular looms had striker levers for driving the shuttle, or levers provided with feet and guided in slots, the feet being actuated by rotary members.

The ilrst mentioned mechanical drives had serious drawbacks owing to the high tension of the warp threads which had to be passed under pressure between the drive rolls and the shuttle, and because even at low outputv the loom wasv of very complicated construction. The inertia prin- .ciple drives on the other hand were lacking in reliability, the great, frictional resistances not being always reliably overcome when the shuttles were driven in this manner while there was also a tendency of the shuttles to jam and injure the warp or damage the loom mechanism.

The last mentioned constructionsgenerally had the fault of insufficient output for the reason that the drive levers for the shuttles also had to perform another function, for example the beating up of the weft, or the change of the shed. This plurality of function necessitated unfavorable shapes of the drive cams and prevented adequate speed of operation being reached.

The present invention overcomes these disadvantages and aims to provide a positive, reliable shuttle drive by actuating the shuttle byl means of leversoperated with a wave motion which acts upon a wedge shaped groove in the shuttle. In this arrangement the 4shuttle has to be supported on the opposite side by fixed guide means.

In addition to absolute reliability the invention has many other advantages. Owing to the exact defining of the shuttle path it is possible to form the lever cams which advance the shuttle, with a veryy short throw or stroke whereby the natural wear is very small. Another important advantage of the positive shuttle guide means in conjunction with the well defined shuttle path,

over the known inertia drives, is that the weight of the shuttle itself can be made much smaller. As a result of this all the machine parts associated with the shuttle drive especially the driving leversl can be made smaller with consequent economy in material and driving power, and reduction of wear.

An example of the mechanism according to the invention is shown in the accompanying drawings, in which:

Fig. 1 is an elevation, jpartly in section, of the mechanism.

Fig. 2 is a plan view.

Fig. 3 is a detail view showing the shuttle in side elevation and its guide means.

' Fig. 4 shows the movable levers in elevation.

Fig. 5 is a plan view of the movable levers.

The mechanism shown in Fig. l comprises a vertical'shaft i rotatably mounted in a hollow column l2 and having a spur gear 2 fast thereon and driving through an intermediate gear San internally toothed gear l on which is rotatably mounted a cross arm member 5 with for instance four arms carrying at their ends curved contact members t. These contact members travel over the ends of the pivoted levers i3 plvotally` mounted on a shaft it, the free ends of said levers I3 forming the track for the shuttle I5. Each shuttle at the front end has a wedge shaped transverse grooveengaged byA a. Wave or ripple I6 produced on the levers when they are actuated by the contact members. The groove has two inclined faces 20, 20a. To move the shuttle forwardly to the left (Fig. 3) the levers I3 actuated by the contact members 6 act upon the surface 20 and at the same time draw forwardly the shuttle guided, on the opposite side between levers. The levers released by the onward travel of the contact members 6 slide backwardly on the inclined surfaces 20a. The two surfaces may be similar whereby the shuttles can also be operated in the reverse direction. The levers may be arranged either horizontally or vertically, as

known in the art, and they may have two arms.

Since the track for the shuttles is bounded upwardly by the reed dents 1, the shuttles are caused to follow reliably the circumferential movement of the lever cam. A guide strip l1 on the shuttle ensures the latter following a circular path. 'Io prevent vibration or chattering of the levers'when the lever. cam moves at high speed thelevers are provided at their outer 5l ends with notches I8 (Fig. 4) in which an endless helical spring or elastic ring 8 is inserted. The levers are also guided at the outer ends by a comb 9 (Fig. 2) or are thickened as shown at I9 (Figs. 4 and 5) so that they mutually support each other. 'I'he warp threads are operated in known manner, by means of cam discs or the like to form a shed, and the Abeating up of the weft is also effected in known manner by levers II actuated by cams.

The loom may have one shuttle or a plurality of shuttles. It will be understood that as the contact members sweep over the inner ends of the levers I3 these are successively rocked on their pivots whereby a wave or ripple is propagated circumferentially on the -plane in which the upper edges of the levers are normally held by the elastic ring 8, or by gravity,'or both. 'I'he edges of the rocked levers forming the wave enter the groove in the shuttle, which groove is substantially aligned with the levers, whereby the shuttle i's carried bythe wave in its circular path.

I claim as my invention: y

1. A circular loom comprising a plurality of movable levers, a shuttle having a wedge-shaped cross groove which drives the shuttle, stationary guide strips arranged opposite the place of engagement of the levers to positively guide the shuttle, and means for actuating the movable levers to drive the shuttle by the engagement of the levers in the cross groove receiving a wave motion.

2. A circular loom according to claim 1, in which the means includes a central shaft and contact members driven by said shaft wherein the wave motion of the levers is effected by the contact members.

3. A circular loom comprising a plurality of movable levers pivoted between their ends, a shuttle having a Wedge-shaped cam groove therein, stationary guide means to positively guide the shuttle, and means for actuating the levers around their pivots to drive the shuttle by the wave motion engagement of the levers in the cam groove.

4. In a circular loom, an annularly arranged series of pivoted levers having at least a portion of their adjacent edges forming a circular shuttle track and normally lying in one plane, a shuttle disposed on said track, `guide means for confining the shuttle movement to said circular track, contact members sweeping over said pivoted levers and successively rocking them on their `pivots thereby producing a wave motion of their edges travelling around the circular shuttle track, said shuttle having means engaged by the moving wave whereby the shuttle is caused to travel around said track, and means biasing said levers to restore the edges of actuated levers to the plane of the shuttle track, said guide means including fixed reed dents each having a central opening anda guide strip on the shuttle which passes through the openings in the reed dents.

5. In a. circular loom, an annularly arranged series of pivoted levers having at least a portion oi their adjacent edges forming a circular shuttle track and normally lying in one plane, a shuttle disposed on said track, guide means for confining the shuttle movement to said circular track, contact members sweeping over said pivoted levers and successively rocln'ng them on their pivots thereby producing a wave motion of their edges travelling around the circular shuttle track, said shuttle having means engaged by the moving wave whereby the shuttle is caused to travel around said track, and means biasing said levers to restore the edges of actuated levers to the plane of the shuttle track, each lever being provided at its free end with a lug to thicken it to determine the spacing of the levers.

6. In a circular loom, an annularly arranged series of pivoted levers having at least a portion of their adjacent edges forming a circular shuttle track and. normally lying in one plane, a

shuttle disposed on said track, guide means for 4conining the shuttle movement to said circular IO'I'IO SCHWICHI'ENBERG. 

